


Past Moments, Past Mistakes

by dawnstruck



Series: Second Chances 'verse [5]
Category: Fullmetal Alchemist (Anime 2003)
Genre: Angst, Domestic, Gen, M/M, Mentions of dub-con
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-02
Updated: 2016-10-02
Packaged: 2018-08-19 03:06:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,443
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8187028
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dawnstruck/pseuds/dawnstruck
Summary: “Hello,” the young man says, “Um. I don't know how to put this, but. I think I am the Führer's son.”





	

**Author's Note:**

> I literally wrote this entire thing in my head while I was taking a shower about a month ago. I'm not exactly sure where it came from.

It's a Sunday afternoon and the house smells of freshly brewed coffee and Gracia's apple pie. Ed knows the recipe by heart but he still always pins the paper up while he bakes, for old times' sake. He rarely gets to see Gracia nowadays, but there is something familiar and soothing in her loopy handwriting, and he likes to remember when their kids had been little and she had taught him how to bake, Alphonse and Elysia always underfoot, begging to get to lick the spoons clean.

Ed had never quite thought of Gracia as a mother figure, not since she and Roy were about the same age which was just too weird, but maybe an older cousin or even a sister. After all, he had helped deliver Elysia, while Gracia had helped him handle Al. Funny, how things had come full circle in that regard.

But then again, Ed's life had always been about making family out of ruins.

Today, they were actually expecting a visitor from East City. Major General Breda was in town to relay how things were going in Roy's old territory, so the two of them were meeting for a formal dinner which would transition into a much less formal private tea time, and then probably descent into a drinking bout once the sun was down.

For now, though, Ed would set the table and wait for Roy and Breda to pick up Al from playing ball with his classmates.

In that moment, the doorbell rings and Ed looks up in surprise, unsure whom to expect.

He's never actually worried that it will be someone dangerous, not since there are guards posted farther down the road who would apprehend any suspicious trespassers, but instincts are even harder to kill than habits, so Ed cannot help but expect something unpleasant when he goes to answer the door.

On the doorstep stands a man, taller than Ed but probably several years younger. He is wearing an uncertain smile and a fuzzy patterned sweater vest over a neat dress shirt.

“May I help you?” Ed asks politely. On the one hand, he is not getting any weird vibes from that guy, but at the same time something about this situation makes him want to slam the door in his face.

“Hello,” the young man says and his voice quavers a little before he clears his throat, “Um. I don't know how to put this, but. I think I am the Führer's son.”

 

The man's name is Phillip Breguet. He accepts Ed's automatic offer of tea but passes up on the pie that sits between them, waiting to cool down.

Ed had used the fancy Xingese tea set that Madame Christmas had given them for their wedding. Back then, he had considered it to be a very tame and tasteful present coming from her, until Roy had leaned in and grinned against his ear, telling him how the colorful paintings on the porcelain, the peonies and turtles and peaches had rather sexual connotations, according to Xingese tradition.

That one, Roy had said and pointed to a drake, Can symbolize the penis, homosexuality, and a faithful marriage. All rather fitting, don't you think?

Phillip Breguet wraps his trembling fingers around the cup with the flute on it, and Ed tries not to think how that one means penis, too, and fellatio, and how Roy got a kick out of offering that cup to unpleasant guests.

The silence is uncomfortable but still neither of them dares to break it. Because the only other alternative is the elephant in the room, and Ed is not quite ready for that. But, as so often, his brain has different plans.

He tries to find hints of Xing in Phillip's features but it's like his mind and eyes won't cooperate, will pinpoint and then deny and move on, time and time again. There is the ink black hair and the vaguely almond shaped eyes, but little more than that. He has a kind face, an open face, and he is handsome. But not like Roy is handsome, not in the same almost aristocratic manner.

Phillip is the boy next door that all the girls fall in love with but that no one ever calls Phil. Roy is the man that makes your heart trip when he holds the door for you, the man that gives you one fleeting smile and then puts you out of his head while you are still starving yourself for him.

Phillip's nose is all wrong, too, and his mouth and his jaw, and he's probably taller than even Roy.

But, a traitorous voice in Ed's head whispers, Maybe the boy just takes after his mother.

“You... probably have questions,” Phillip says, carefully placing the cup in the saucer, but it still clinks loud like a drumbeat, “And... I don't really have any answers. Mostly, I came here because of my own questions.”

“Then,” Ed says, licking his dry lips, “Why don't you begin with what you know?”

Phillip gives a short nod.

“My mother, Liliane Breguet,” Phillip says with a pained smile, “Was a sergeant, stationed in Ishval during the civil war. That's where she met my father and where she got pregnant. When she found out, she'd already been sent back to the home front in West City, so she retired from duty and returned to Gegota where she had been born and where she gave birth to me.”

He pauses for a moment, seems rueful, caught in the past.

“We lived with my grandparents. They were good people, but they had never approved of her joining the military, nor of her having a child out of wedlock. Gegota is a small town. People talk. It wasn't always easy for us.”

Another pause, this time more out of hesitation, but then he gives himself a push. “My mother never told me much about her time in Ishval. Which is normal, I guess. All she ever revealed was that my father was a handsome, dark-haired man. A major at that time and later a decorated war hero.”

There must be dozens of those, Ed thinks feebly. There's no reason to believe that any of that had anything to do with his own family.

“I don't know how they met exactly,” Phillip continues, “Just that, at some point, he saved her. She never told me from what, but. It made her fall in love. They... had an affair or a relationship, I don't even know. War is probably not very conductive of romance.” He gives an awkward little laugh but then sobers again.

“This winter, she... caught pneumonia and passed away. I went through her belongings and found... a lot of newspaper clippings regarding the President Führer. Some of them rather recent and some... dating way back to the end of the war, when he was first praised for his accomplishments.”

Quickly, Ed does the math in his head, rough and vague as it may be. Roy had been twenty-four by the end of the civil war, and he had only served during the last year.

That meant that Phillip was now maybe twenty years old, barely five years younger than Ed. And he claimed to essentially be Ed's stepson.

No, not Ed's stepson. Just Roy's biological son.

“Why... why did you come to tell me this?” Ed asks, stammers, “Why not...”

The name fails him, too beloved for this earth-shuddering moment.

“I wanted to,” Phillip says, “I wanted to ask whether he is home and whether I might talk to him. But when I saw you, I panicked. The last... the last newspaper article my mother saved wasn't of the election or anything like that but... the one of your wedding. I think... that was the point she really gave up on him.”

Ed is glad he hasn't had any of the pie yet either because he is sure he would just start puking it out right about now. But he forces himself to remain calm, takes deep steadying breaths through his nose.

“I know this is horrible timing,” Phillip hurries to says, “I know you are expecting guests and I should have called beforehand but I thought he might just not want to see me then. And... I've been battling with myself for these past months, wondering whether I should even try to contact him in the first place. That's why I'm kind of... relieved... to have run into your first. Talking to you is so much easier.” He swallows, clenches his eyes shut, “I don't think I'm ready to meet him yet. But... you know him. You know how he might react. Or... whether he ever mentioned my mother.”

There is a blizzard inside of Ed, splinters of ice like broken glass digging deep into his heart, but he is numb to the pain.

Roy had spoken of past lovers, fleetingly and sparingly. Ed was not prone to jealousy, not so many years later, not when he was so sure of Roy. He had long since accepted that – just because Roy had been his first in all regards – he could not retroactively expect the same of Roy.

Ed could no more undo Roy's past affairs than he could undo his war crimes, and even if he could he knew what he would rather choose. These things were part of Roy, for better or for worse, and Ed had no business wishing to erase any of it.

Roy's past lovers were just that – a thing of the past. Until now. Now, the embodiment of these shadows was sitting across from Edward and nervously sipping his tea.

“I- he hasn't,” Ed replies, digging through his brain, trying to recall whether he has ever heard of a Liliane Breguet. Roy, too, rarely spoke of Ishval, and often in a detached and downright professional manner.

I was a ghost, he had once said, with an odd faraway look in his eyes, A deadly, deadly ghost. I _burned_. When I ate, I tasted ashes. When I slept, I dreamed of flames. I wasn't myself. Or rather, I started thinking that that was who I was. I didn't dare touch anyone. I thought I'd only burn them, too. Maes and- and Riza and Jean, they kept me from self-destruction, but. Some days I felt like one of Kimblee's breathing bombs.

To Ed, that didn't sound like Roy had been very willing or even capable of throwing himself into a woman's arms. But maybe he had tried. Maybe he had tried to kiss it away, to fuck it away. Maybe he had failed. But even if it was just one night, if it were just five minutes – it would have been enough for this boy to be born.

So a little bit of desperate fun, of skin-on-skin contact and the rush of orgasm had been so much more to this young woman who was in love and who ended up with a kid she had to raise on her own while the father went on to greater things, oblivious and now with a family of his own.

Outside, a car pulls up in the driveway. The engine quietens, dies, three doors open and then slam shut. Ed wants to stop time, to stall it, to reverse it to fifteen minutes ago when this day had still been perfectly normal.

There is some laughter, a key is turned in the lock and the front door opens. Ed scrapes his chair back and stands up like a puppet, wooden and with little control over his limbs.

“Boss!” Breda's voice calls out, “The chief just told me the most outrageous story and I refuse to believe it until I've heard your take on it!”

“It's true!” Roy insists, “I may have exaggerated it a little here and there-”

“You said there were a dozen peacocks involved-”

“So maybe two peacocks, where's the difference-”

“In the ten peacocks-”

“Daddy, is the pie ready yet-”

“Alphonse, you _just_ had a hot dog-”

“I played ball all day!”

“Yeah, chief, he's a growing boy-”

They stumble into the living-room, Al dirty from head to toe, Roy and Breda in their uniforms but with the collars loosened, their arms thrown around each other and looking as thought they had already started on the drinking, and Al is probably dragging mud everywhere, but Ed just doesn't care.

Phillip has stood up as well, fumbling to straighten his cuff links, his head a little ducked.

“Oh,” Roy says and immediately straightens, very diligent about up-holding his facade as the mostly impeccable Führer in front of people he doesn't know, “I didn't know we were expecting another guest.”

“I- I'm sorry,” Phillip hurries to say, “I showed up without prior warning. If it's too inconvenient right now, I can leave-”

He makes to step out from behind the table and probably clamber out of the window, rather than pass by Roy who is still blocking the threshold. But the boy had come this far. He deserved to get something in return for his courage.

“Roy,” Ed says, well aware of how mechanic his voice sounds, “This is Phillip Breguet.”

“Yes?” Roy asks, apparently not knowing what to make of that name.

“Liliane Breguet's son,” Ed clarifies, helplessly watching as understanding spills itself into Roy's eyes.

“I see,” he says slowly and, suddenly, it is even harder to breathe.

“Say, Al,” Breda pipes up, settling a big hand on Al's small shoulder, even as his sharp gaze carefully studies the tense faces in the room, “How about we ask your dad to save us some of that apple pie and the two of us go grab some ice cream? Good old male bonding.”

“Sure,” Al says a little too brightly because he, too, is good a reading a situation. He's learned from the best, after all.

“See ya later, then,” Breda announces, steering Al back into the hallway and out of the house. The door closes and then they are alone.

“That- that was your son?” Phillip asks carefully, “Alphonse, right?”

Ed gives a mute nod, but on the inside he is screaming. Because what Phillip is really asking is, Could this be my little brother? Or worse, Is this the kid that gets to be the Führer's son although he doesn't have his blood? Is this the epitome of what should have been mine?

“Mister Breguet,” Roy says, stepping closer, “I am pleased to make your acquaintance. How is your mother doing?”

Don't ask that now if you obviously haven't given damn in twenty years, Ed rails inwardly but just falls back down onto his chair.

“She- she passed away in January,” Phillip explains, with the brave sort of smile that tries to discourage people from giving their condolences and also reassures them that it is quite alright to have ripped open old wounds, “That's why I came here, actually.”

“I'm afraid I don't quite understand,” Roy says and he is sending a sidelong glance at Edward.

“I have some... questions,” Phillip says, “Um. Questions you might be able to answer.”

“He's your son, Roy,” Ed says and it bursts from him like a geyser, hot and sudden, “He's your son, so don't you fucking call him Mister Breguet.”

Because this boy has just lost his mother while his father had been nothing but stories, this vague idea lingering at the fringes of his childhood. It's not like Ed doesn't know what that feels like.

“I'm- sorry?” Roy looks truly flummoxed now, his carefully composed facade crumbling, “I think there's been a misunderstanding.”

“No, I- I did some research,” Phillip points out, “It all matches up, all the- And my mother always spoke very highly of you.”

“Why don't we all sit down,” Roy proposes, and Ed hates him a little for how how calm and reasonable he sounds. “I think there is a lot we need to talk about.”

 

“I don't expect anything from you,” is the first thing Phillip points out when he has finished explaining everything else, “I don't want money or- or your name or anything. I know how the press is and I don't want to cause you any trouble, none of you. I tried to talk myself out of it, but once I had started thinking about it, I couldn't stop. And- I work for a publishing company, and just last month I realized that we have published some of your latest works, Professor, and I don't know why that changed anything but it felt like more than a coincidence. Suddenly I just- I just had to know. If you never want to see me again, I underst-”

“Mister Breguet,” Roy cuts in and then, more softly, he adds, “Phillip, please. There's no reason to be upset. We can talk about this and I hope it will help you in some manner.”

He pauses, for effect, for breath, it's hard to tell, “But I am not your father.”

He says it with the conviction of a politician, but politicians _lie_ , and Phillip looks so heart-breakingly broken that Ed shatters right along with him.

“I'm truly sorry to disappoint you, Phillip,” Roy explains, “I'm afraid I only knew your mother passingly, and all of our exchanges were nothing but professional. Fraternization might have often been tolerated, but I was a Major and far outranked her. Unfortunately, I also do not know whom she was close to during that time, neither in a romantic nor a platonic manner, so I don't know in which direction to point you.”

“But-,” Phillip tries, chokes a little, “Why would she save all these articles-?”

“I do not know,” Roy gives a small shake of his head, “It is true that I was involved in a... minor rescue mission and that it included your mother. Either that just so happens to coincide with the description of your father or... she tried to paint a picture of him for you and for herself. Maybe she didn't know him well. Maybe he died in the war.”

A smile, a sincere one that has a too much of an edge to it. Roy is hiding something and Ed wants to lob the the fucking plate with the sexual peaches at his head.

“If there is anything else I could help you with,” Roy offers, “Access to non-classified records, information on whom your mother was stationed with, I will do my best to accommodate you.”

“N-no,” Phillips stutters out, “That's quite alright. I- I guess if she didn't want me to know... And... it was only this crazy idea I had. I don't know why I got so obsessed with it, it's silly.”

“You're still grieving,” Roy knows, “You are lonely. And you want new answers for old questions. There's nothing wrong with that.”

“Thank you,” Phillip says and then stands rather abruptly. His tea cup is still half-full but long since gone cold. “Thank you for your time and- and your understanding. Not everyone would have been so kind.”

“It's the least I can do,” Roy claims as he accompanies Phillip into the hallway, “I wish there were more.”

But at the same time he is already opening the door, a rather unsubtle way of showing that, for his part, this conversation is already over.

“For whatever it's worth,” Roy says as he shakes the boy's hand, “As President Führer, I consider myself honorary father, uncle, brother, and son of everyone in Amestris. I wish you all the best, Phillip.”

“Thank you, sir,” Phillip nearly trips over the way he nods his own head, blind and helpless, “And you, too, Professor.”

Ed nods as well but cannot bring himself to offer his hand so Phillip doesn't try either.

When he is halfway out the door, however, Ed calls after him.

“Hey, kid,” he says and Phillips stumbles around to properly face him.

“Maybe your father's dead or maybe he is a bastard who was never really there for you,” Ed tells him, his throat closing up, “But I bet your mom loved you very much.”

“Yes,” Phillip says and his dark-brown eyes glisten, “Yes, she did.”

The door closes and Ed waits five seconds, watching through the narrow window pane in the wood as Phillip's silhouette grows smaller as he walks down the driveway, ten second till the gate closes behind him and he is walking down the road to get to his hotel or to the train that will take him back to Gegota or West City or whatever place he calls home. Fifteen seconds, and he must definitely be out of earshot.

Finally, Ed can rage freely.

“Why did you lie to him?” he erupts and Roy looks like he had been expecting it but still flinches rather violently.

“I didn't-” he tries to defend himself but Ed is having none of it.

“Don't you fucking dare lie to me now, I can fucking tell, okay?” Ed hisses, “And I deserve the fucking truth, I am your husband and- and this kid is apparently your son-”

“Ed-”

“-and you sent him away like a stray dog, who the fuck does that-”

“Edward, he is not my-”

“Bloody fucking likely with all these coincidences-”

“If you would just-”

“Just because you fucked his mother and never bothered to think of her ever again-”

“She was raped!” Roy snaps, a wild and vaguely nauseous look on him, and Ed jerks back, blinks through hazy eyes, realizes that his vision is obscured by what cannot possibly be tears.

“... what?” he stammers, his voice suddenly very small.

“She was...,” Roy begins and then breaks off again, “Ed, of course I remember her. My platoon was transferred farther South and we were stationed together for a while. I never really knew her, I just... Maes got wind of the fact that one of the sergeants was being coerced by her superiors. There weren't a lot of women at the front. And those who were,... weren't always as skilled as Riza at deflecting unwanted advances. Sergeant Breguet had been pressured into a sexual relationship and probably saw no way of getting out of it.”

“What,” Ed tries, blinks in confusion because this still doesn't add up, “What does this have to do with you?”

“Of the people who knew, I was the only one who outranked her captain,” Roy explains, “So I confronted him.”

His right fist clenches in a telltale sign of what he rather would have done with the man, and the corner of his mouth twitches into a tight grimace. “The man was put on trial and dishonorably discharged. Miss Breguet chose to leave the military, unsurprisingly.” A cynical tilt to the words, proof of how much he still hates this institution that he has sworn himself to.

“But, Edward,” he implores, “I never touched her. I barely even spoke to her, apart from originally ascertaining the situation and asking for her permission to take action. I never saw her again and I never knew she was pregnant.”

“Then why... why would she tell her son...?”

Roy shrugs. “Denial. Kindness. Telling your child that they were not born out of love but... this. Rosé certainly hasn't told her son yet, has she? And at which point would you even bring that up, at which age? When is your child old enough to know that it exists because of the violence its parent had to endure?”

And isn't that quite reminiscent of their own situation, that terrible secret they've been keeping for the past decade?

But Roy just sucks in a breath, soldiers onward. “A lie would have been easier, for both of them. Maybe... she eventually started to believe it herself. Maybe she wanted to. I don't know. And I don't know what else to tell you, except that I am not that boy's father.”

There is a beat of silence as the truth seems to sink into the carpet and the floorboards, the weight of it lifted off their shoulders.

“Not to mention,” Roy adds, chuckles in a misplaced attempt of humor, “Aunt Chris would have castrated me if I ever forgot to use contraception.”

Ed takes a breath that seems to extend not only his rib cage but his entire being.

“You were at war, Roy,” he points out, “You were traumatized. You told me yourself that there are pieces missing, that you sometimes had blackouts and- and rearranged some of the stuff that happened.”

“Yes,” Roy says, brokenly, “Yes, but Edward, everything regarding Sergeant Breguet happened early on. I'd been in Ishval for less than two months, I had only just gotten my promotion, I didn't yet know how to handle certain matters and I didn't exactly act according to protocol. But I wasn't changed yet. Chilled to the bone, yes. Horrified of what humans could do to each other. And then... then I find out that among all the terrible things that are happening for the supposed good of our country- I find out that one of our sergeants is getting coerced by someone within the ranks. That could have been Riza. That could have been _me_. For the first time, I realized what hierarchy really meant. Not just obedience, but oppression.”

Roy had gotten to experience that same oppression for himself, hadn't he? When he had voiced his doubts regarding the treatment of the Ishvalans and he had been taken on a shorter leash. When he had been ordered to shoot Winry's parents and told he'd be stood up at the wall right next to them if he didn't do it.

“So,” Roy says, “Now that that's settled, I would like an apology.”

Ed's head jerks up, “What?”

“Though I do understand your tendency of prematurely jumping to conclusions,” Roy tells him, “I have to wonder why you would rather believe a random stranger's assumptions than when I am telling you the truth.”

Because the human brain is wired to recognize patterns, even if those patterns aren't really there. Phillip's brain had seen a pattern that said Führer President Elric-Mustang had to be his father. Ed's brain had seen a pattern that said that there had been a time in Roy's life, a time roughly twenty years ago, during which he had loved a lot and loved so carelessly, that it was not a stretch to believe that sometimes accidents happened.

Ed's mistake had been alchemical instead of sexual but he had still unexpectedly ended up with a kid. And Roy certainly wasn't infallible.

“Because I _love_ you,” Ed says and doesn't know why it sounds so desperate. “Because I love you and there are parts of each other that we will never fully know and that's okay, I tell myself that it's okay and it should be enough, but then there are people that know not- not _more_ about you maybe, but other parts of you, different parts of you, older parts. And sometimes I hate Riza for it and Chris and even Gracia because they knew you long before I was there, before I was even born, and- And I'm not jealous, not really, but- I want to know you best, all of it, even the bad things, even if you had three other wives before me and a dozen of children and a really hairy ugly mole on your ass-”

“I don't-”

“I'd still want to know that because it means you trust me with everything about you, all the great parts and the shitty parts, it means you love me, too-”

“Oh, but I do, Edward,” Roy insists and then he is sweeping Ed into his arms, “I love you and you mustn't ever doubt that. I have never loved anyone nearly as a fervently as I have loved you, and I have certainly never been in love. No one could ever hold a candle to the sun, Edward.”

Ed sniffles but refuses to cry. Yet the past half hour has been too much of a tornado for him to not feel unsteady on his feet.

They stand embracing each other and Ed hurts with how tightly Roy is holding him, but it would hurt even more to let go, so they just cling on, eternally.

“How long... how long have you been thinking like that?” Roy asks at length, his face somewhere in Ed's hair, “This doesn't seem... Please don't tell me you've been thinking that since the beginning.”

Reluctantly Ed shakes his head against Roy's neck, swallows before he is able to talk again.

“When I... when I forgot everything,” he admits, “Or rather, when I remembered again. I kept thinking that there were still things I had lost. Things that would never come back and no one would ever know because only I had known. I thought, maybe at some point I had woken up at night and watched you sleep and realized for the first time that I always wanted to be with you. Or- or that I forgot a certain kiss or a certain look, those little things that don't amount to much, but- but they are part of what we became.”

He takes a moment, reflects on what has happened in his head.

“When Phillip showed up,” he croaks, “He just said he might be your son. And I thought, sure, why not, things always go shit in one way or the other. And it's not even shit. He's a good kid, yeah? Even if his mom was still alive, even if you still loved her in a way – I would have just rolled with it. A stepbrother for Al. Cool, let's go for it. But. I guess my brain just short-circuited and reminded itself of how much it has fucked up in the past.”

“Oh, Edward, love.” If possible, Roy holds him even closer. “I had no idea you were still bothered by what happened back then.”

“Yeah,” Ed chuckles weakly, “Same here. You'd think I'd be used to losing bits and pieces of myself every now and then...”

“Even if you do,” Roy whispers roughly, “I will always wholly love you.”

He's kissing Ed's temple then and starts migrating to his cheek, but their mouths are magnets and quickly find each other.

There is always something special about making out in a hallway, Ed thinks. Something urgent and deliberate. In a hallway there are many doors and many ways to go, but instead you choose to stop and kiss, no matter how little time there is.

They do it every morning when they part to go to work, and they had done it the first time they kissed. They did it two weeks ago when they had come come home late from a stupid dinner party, when they had stumbled through the door and started kissing before it even fell shut, kissing and kissing and trying to decide in which room they would rather fuck that night, because all the options were right there.

This time, however, they are rather rudely interrupted.

“That is so embarrassing,” Al complains where he stands in the doorway, key still in hand.

“Yup,” Breda agrees, “So you have to make sure to never let them live it down.”

“Daddy, you have spit on your lips,” Al's nose wrinkles, “I think it's father's.”

“And you have chocolate ice cream all over your face,” Ed taunts as he extricates himself from Roy's embrace, “So don't go pointing fingers.” He still self-consciously wipes the back of his hand over his mouth.

“What even happened here?” Breda shakes his head, “We were go for twenty minutes and it looked like a funeral here. But now _this_.”

“It's always like that,” Al explains, “They get these really scary looks on their faces as though the world were about to end, and then they are sucking face in some corner.”

“Al!” Ed chides.

“I am looking forward to when you come home with your first boyfriend or girlfriend,” Roy drawls, “So many opportunities for revenge.”

“Uncle Heymans, father is threatening me,” Al wails and dramatically buries his face in his hands before he runs to the living-room, doubtlessly to finally get his hands on the apple pie.

“Just one day,” Roy says, shaking his head, “Just one normal ordinary day in this house.”

“That would be boring,” Breda huffs and when he steps in he gives Ed a hearty clap on the back, “So! How about that apple pie? Gracia asked me to decide on whose is best.”

“Well,” Ed replies, “I'm still sticking to her recipe, so...”

“Doesn't mean you haven't made it your own,” Breda knows and Ed has no reason to disagree.

 

**Author's Note:**

> Parellels, parallels~ Next part is called "Young Heart, Young Hope" in which Alphonse will finally find out about his origins. No guarantees, but I'll try to get it out sometime in November.


End file.
